Created & Discipled for Good Works Here & There

Acts 2:5-12

Of all the animals in the zoo, none was more popular than the lion. There were other animals that were more powerful, and some more colorful, but the lions had something that drew the crowds. It had not always been this way. But now every survey pointed in the same direction -- the action was with the lions.

The other animals took note, and one day a leopard was talking with his friends. “When my father was young, people came to see us leopards, but now people pass us by on the way to the lions. We really have to do something about this.” “Well,” said one of the other leopards, “lions don’t look so different from us. If it wasn’t for our spots, people might not know the difference. Why don’t we change the sign on our cage and say that we are lions too?” And so they did.

The next day, the donkeys had a discussion. “No one is visiting us,” one of them said. “All we hear about is the lions.” “Well,” said one of the donkeys, “we are not so different from the lions.” “After all we have four legs and a decent tail. It’s only our color that is different, and the shape of our bodies. We don’t need to be ashamed about those things. Why don’t we change the sign on our cage from donkeys to lions?”

“Well, we don’t sound like lions,” said one of they donkeys. “But we could try.” So the donkeys tried to roar, but it didn’t work very well. After a while they gave up. “People will need to understand that we are a very distinctive kind of lion,” they said…

Over the next years the lion movement continued to grow. The squirrels were drawn into the movement. After all, like lions, they could climb, and they could run. They did have a problem with diet, being vegetarians rather than carnivores. But when they changed the sign on their small cage, they agreed that this was their distinctive within the great family of lions.

Among the last to join the movement were the eagles. There were some traditionalist eagles who insisted that they were nothing like lions since their distinctive was to fly. “Lions can’t fly!” they said. However they were eventually outvoted by more progressive eagles who pointed out that eagles do eat meat, and have more right to be called lions than the squirrels who eat nuts. So the sign on their cage was changed also.

And so it was that when children visited the zoo, they learned many things:

Some lions have a golden yellow coat, but some have spots.
Some lions roar but some make a strange braying noise.
Some lions are very small and eat nuts,
And while most lions are limited to travel on the ground, some are able to soar in the sky.

Then one day the original lions called a conference. The subject for their meeting was a forum entitled, “What is a lion?” “Today we are faced with a situation in which the word lion means many different things. We now have lions with spots and lions who fly as well as the more traditional golden lions, who stay on the ground, and communicate with an old fashioned roar.”

Some of the lions were very enthusiastic about this. “There never has been a more wonderful time to be a lion,” some said… “But there is a problem,” said Leo, one of the senior members of the clan. “The problem is that the word ‘lion’ does not mean anything any more.”

There was a long silence, as the lions considered their predicament. Some wondered if they needed a new name – something like roaring, unspotted, ground-based, meat-eating lions. But that seemed much too cumbersome. In the end Leo broke the silence. “I propose,” he said, “that we begin a new program to teach our cubs what it really means to be a lion… We must tell our cubs that real lions eat meat and that lions do not fly.”

Leo had hardly finished the sentence when he was interrupted. “You can’t possibly teach that,” one of the lions roared.” “You will offend the others!”

But in the end, the lions agreed. They had to teach the cubs what it means to be a lion. And the best way to do that is to tell them what the word lion used to mean, in the days when words used to mean something before so many other animals started using the word. “Let’s go back to the beginning,” they said, “If we do not do this, our cubs will grow up not knowing what it means to be a lion at all.”

From The Parable of the Zoo Animals by Colin Smith

I remembered this insightful parable as I was preparing for my message in this year’s series of messages on being The Church: Here and There. As we say so often here at LAC, we seek to be a “breathing church”, gathering in our services to breathe in (i.e., to worship God together, to learn from his Word, and to deepen our commitments to the Lord) so that we can leave our worship gatherings and “breathe out” – both through evangelism and compassion, both “here” in our neighborhood and “there” in the world.

But the big question that arises when we talk about us going out and being the church here and there is very basic: “What is the church?” A building? A social justice organization? A social club of homogeneous people who like the same kinds of music? Any gathering of a few people who do something religious in their homes with people they like? The answers to this question are so varied that many gatherings that sure seem to look like churches have chosen to take the name “church” out of their gatherings altogether. I think we’re at the point the lions had come to in the parable: We need to go back to the beginning to see what the church looked like when people first knew what it was.

And that takes us to Acts 2 and the Day of Pentecost, often referred to as the birthday of the church.

What Was Pentecost?

Pentecost is the day we remember the Holy Spirit being poured out on all who follow Jesus in faith. But, Pentecost had been a Jewish feast days for many centuries before Acts 2 happened. The term Pentecost referred to 50 – 50 days after the great rescue of the Israelites from Egypt. At Pentecost, the Jewish people remembered when God had appeared to Moses on Mt. Sinai and given the 10 Commandments as the foundational document for his people’s lives. The Israelites viewed that event as the birthday of their nation. Read about it in Exodus 19 – it’s thrilling. God came down in wind and fire veiled with smoke and declared that the Israelites were his people and they were to live as he commanded so that life might “go well” for them. Before that event, the Israelites were simply a fragmented nomadic people united by bloodline. After the giving of the commandments, they became the people of God united by their commitment to Jehovah and his ways. So, when the day began, they were one thing, and when it ended, they were God’s chosen people.

With that in mind, we can begin to understand what the Acts 2 Pentecost was about. The long prophesied Messiah had come in Jesus. He had suffered and died for sins just as the prophets had foretold. And he had defeated death through his resurrection. So, in Acts 1, Jesus said that he was ascending to the Father but that his followers had to wait for the giving of the Holy Spirit to come – not just on a few but upon all who follow Jesus. The time would come when everyone who called upon the name of the Lord would be saved.

What happens in Acts 2 is that what the Old Testament had prophesied and Jesus had said would take place is launched. God’s people, from that day forward, would be formed on the basis of faith in Jesus. From that day forward, God’s people were to be united not by shared bloodlines but by the shared Holy Spirit. This was the church. So, Acts 2 was the birthday of the church – a people ultimately to be made up of every tribe, language and nation. I want us to look at how the church is described on that day. When we do what the lions in the parable did, i.e., teach our children what the church is, the place to begin is Acts 2.

What is the church? The church is a people in which:

#1: Each one has personal access to God.

When God was identifying Israel as his people in Exodus 19, he appeared to them as fire – but only at a great distance and even that with many levels of protection for the people from the divine fire. The reason people didn’t get too close to God of course is that God is holy and the people were unholy. Back in Exodus 19, the sinless Son of God had not yet provided atonement for sins.

So, God revealed himself as fire. Fire expresses beauty but also purity. Fire shows that, although God is personal and good, he is not safe for sinful people to encounter. We need fire in this world – but not too close. Fire can make us warm – but it can burn us if we’re too close. So, essentially, the people would say in Exodus 19, “We need to hear from God but not too closely. Moses, you go hear him and tell us what he says.” And that’s what happened in Exodus 19. Only Moses had close access to God.

But, in Acts 2:3, the fire comes on each person’s head. I love how it’s put: The one fire that came “separated and came to rest on each of them.” Do you see what it’s saying? Because of the cross of Jesus, our sin is atoned for. Now, unholy people can be declared right with God and have access to him. If Moses had been there in Acts 2, I think he would have said, “Do you know what you’re being offered as that fire comes to each one? Each one of you can now hear from God. Each one of you can know God. The holy God has come to meet each one.” So, the church is a place in which each one of us can know God personally – and hear from him personally. This comes through faith in the crucified and resurrected and ascended Jesus.

#2: Each one is a minister of God.

At that first Pentecost in Exodus 19, only one person went up the mountain and only one person brought God’s message -- Moses. And Moses’ message was “the Law” – i.e., this is how you were made to live! But, as we know, no one was able to live that way perfectly. All fell short of God’s glory.

But in Acts 2:4, “all of them began to speak.” According to v. 11, they were all declaring the “wonders of God.” Each one in the church had a message from God. Each one was God’s spokesperson. And, in vv. 17-18, we are told that this was exactly what God had said would happen in the prophetic book of Joel. God had said, “The day will come when I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Sons and daughters, young men and old, men and women – all will speak of me. Each one will be a minister. And the message will not be the Law but the fact that God has done great things. It will be that God is a God who will rescue us by his grace – not by our works in keeping the Law.”

So, the church is a people in which 1) each one has a personal relationship with God through faith in Jesus and 2) each one has a ministry from God through the empowering of the Holy Spirit. I’m not saying that we should not have those in the church who are set aside and financially supported to teach the Word and to train all to serve. That’s clear from Scripture. But, when the church becomes a people in which we come to be served -- evaluate whether we like it or whether it fits our taste – instead of a people in which each one serves each one and each one tells of the greatness of God, we are no longer the church.

#3: Each one is a part of God’s new community.

Here at LAC, we call the church “God’s unexpected family” – not unexpected to God but to people in our world. In our divided world, people do not expect to see one family made up of Jew and Gentile, rich and poor, all skin colors and all ages. Only God can bring about that kind of unity in our fragmented and divided world. But we see it in v. 5: People from every nation under heaven together heard the message of God and heard it in their own language through a group of Galileans. (Galileans were known to have a very strong accent – almost impossible for others to understand. No one would have expected Galileans to be the ones making God’s good news plain to others. They were the blue collar Jewish people. This was a bit like Bubba Watson winning the Masters’ Golf Tournament in Augusta.) But, when they spoke, all understood.

So, was this miracle of the message being communicated to all language groups a miracle of tongues or a miracle of ears? It was probably both. Just a partial list of the diversity of the hearers is given in vv. 9-12 including Egyptians, Libyans, Italians, and Arabs. The powerful declaration is in v. 21, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” And let me say clearly: Everyone includes everyone!

So much can be said about this. But, I believe a local church should be intentional about being the kind of community that our Father’s church already is. When a church becomes a place in which we only want to be with people we like and feel comfortable with, then we are not really the church. Like the leopards or donkeys, we might say we are a very distinctive kind of church, but I believe we will find instead that we are a different kind of animal.

So, when a church becomes a place in which 1) we come to be served by others instead of to be serving others, we become something very different from the church. And, 2) when we are not intentional about welcoming people from every ethnicity, every age group, every socio-economic level, we look a lot different from the church that is our Father’s. When we fall into that trap that says that well educated people should be in church with well educated people, Caribbean people should be with Caribbean people, the young should be with the young, people who love country music with those who love country music, we become prey to the evil one’s love to bring about endless divisions in the family of God.

#4: Each one participates in God’s mission.

We will be talking more about this mission over the coming weeks. Let me simply say here that God’s mission includes both speaking of God’s salvation through faith alone in Christ alone (evangelism) and showing God’s love through compassion and justice ministries. God’s mission always calls for ministries in which we are involved 1) both here, in our own neighborhood 2) and there, in places all around the world. For when the mission is complete, Revelation 7:9 will be a reality. The end will look a lot like Acts 2 at that first Pentecost except that by Revelation 7:9, each one in the church will be complete in Christ.

And, I have a final thought for us as a church. There are rare times and places when one local church can be a church involved in God’s mission in a special way because the “here and there” both are here! What do I mean by that? I mean that our area is becoming one of the most culturally and ethnically diverse areas in the world. People from all over the world are here in our neighborhood but often maintaining close relationships to their homelands. And, with world-class educational institutions in our backyard like Cal Tech and Fuller, we have global leaders with us for a number of years – eventually to return as leaders to their own nations. What an opportunity God is affording us to be involved in his global mission here at LAC!

And we sense God may be leading us in new ways of building his community with diversity at LAC. We’re envisioning more and more of a variety of different first language groups worshipping together in our larger worship settings and then perhaps having closer interaction with one another of shared heritage in smaller group settings we call “communities”. We know that we need places in our church life both in which we show the unity of the body of Christ and also settings in which we can ask, “Given our shared cultural heritage, how do we follow Jesus in the location in which God has placed us?” If you would be interested in serving ministries related to this – ministries that may include things like sermon translation, technical skill, or small group leadership, please visit us at “Pathways.” Also, leaders from both our Fellowship of Int'l Students (FIS) and AL Haq (our Muslim outreach/evangelism) are here and will be available to speak with you about how to engage in ministry “there” while you are “here”.

Our prayer is that, when Jesus comes and completes his work, he will look at LAC and say, “Now, that’s what I gave my life to bring about. That’s the church! That’s what I saw starting in Acts 2 and culminating when I’m done with my church in Revelation 7. That is one unexpected family of people brought together by faith, held together and empowered by the Holy Spirit, and deeply engaged in our Father’s glorious mission” – to his glory.

To His glory,

Dr. Greg Waybright
Senior Pastor